Pity the wannabee millionaires of Peru stuck in public office

Carranza wearing an expensive suit

Luis Carranza, Peru's Minister of the Economy, is now ex-Minister of the Economy. He presented his resignation last night, citing "family reasons". Alan's mini-me Del Castillo this morning said that (and I quote). "Economically (speaking) he was not very happy. He has young children to maintain and he must have used up what he could of his savings."

Is this some kind of joke? Firstly, we have an (ex) economy minister in charge of a whole country who can't even manage his own home economics? Second, I'm pretty sure Carranza's salary is a touch above the Peru national average and there are plenty plenty Peruvians who, on reading Del Castillo's comments this morning, will suddenly realize what kind of two-tier society they're living in.

What total bullshit. This is just another example of the lather-rinse-repeat cycle of economists who try and fail to be patriotic. Some private studio or public company has obviously offered him a juicy salary and half the hours and none of that press conference stuff. More money and less responsibility.... the Amerikan dream. This lilly-livered, self serving greed is then presented to us in a "family reasons" package. Public service? Dude, this is capitalism...don't get all soft on me.

So who's next? Jungle drums say it's a guy named Valdivieso, a fat, neolib economist with the personality of a kilo of rice who's been doing his thing at the IMF for a while, will be the next in line. Sadly, his greatest claim to fame in Peru is being the son of somebody famous, namely an ex-goalkeeper in local team Alianza Lima.

Pay peanuts, (you know the rest)